The Girls Who Taught Me I Was Gay

Jeremy Feist waxes nostalgic about the girls he loved before he came out.

Like most faglets born into a hetero-normative society, it took me a while before I finally clued into the fact that I liked dong and chest hair more than vajooter and tits. That being said, I didn’t get around to that little nugget of info until I hit high school, which gave me seven wonderful, asexual years of platonic romance. Here’s to those six girls I gave my tiny, confused heart to in the years leading up to my coming out.

Lisa P.

Lisa was my very first “girlfriend,” if that’s what you’d call it. I chose Lisa as my girlfriend on my first day of Kindergarten, because she had the same name as Lisa from The Simpsons, and to my feeble little mind, I assumed that by dating Lisa P. I would be dating Lisa Simpson. I was fucking stupid as a kid.

Lisa had a thing for wearing sweaters that made her look like a Shetland puppy, a blonde Dorothy Hamill bob, and pink capris. Years later, she would fold all of these disparate elements into her own personal style. Her nose was constantly running like a goddamn faucet and she had a habit of peeing herself, but more importantly, her parents were rich and the loot bags at her birthday parties were fucking insane. Seriously, one year they gave away something like fifty bajillion Pokemon cards. How sweet is that?

Lesson Learned: It doesn’t matter how gross someone is on the outside, as long as they have a ton of money.

Katherine with a K

After dumping Lisa P. halfway through Kindergarten, Katherine with a K swooped in like a vulture going in on a freshly run-over armadillo. Katherine was the first in a long line of big girls I would “date” in elementary school. Before I go any further, I should probably mention that in St. John Fisher, hand-holding was roughly the pre-teen equivalent of getting to third-base. And holy shit, was Katherine with a K down to hold hands. In class, during nap time, waiting in line after recess to come back in… It was always hand-holding time with Katherine with a K. That being said, Katherine with a K was a total Vespa: Fun to ride, but not while anyone was looking. Not because she was big, but because everyone thought that girls had cooties, which effectively made me patient zero. We slowly grew apart, and she started giving someone else her sweet, sweet hand-holding. Whoever that lucky man is, I salute you.

Lesson Learned: Big girls and gay dudes are natural soul mates. They’re like chocolate and peanut butter, or weed and Adult Swim. I’ve known many big girls in my life and all of them have made for amazing friends.

Andrea

By the time we hit third grade, the other boys were starting to get the hint that pretty girls with blonde hair and tan skin and blue eyes were the ones you wanted to date. Enter Andrea, and all her Aryan beauty. Andrea was popular, cute, and a total bitch. After a brief hand-holding, she blew me off and started cycling through the most popular boys in the class, Brian, Jordan and Jesse, which made me jealous. Oddly, I was actually jealous of her, for reasons made clear in the future. Although she give all three of them head lice, so that wasn’t exactly any skin off my ass.

Lesson Learned: Pretty people will eventually give you “head lice.” That being said, it’ll be totally sweet because you’ll get to skip three whole days of school.

Stacey P.

Stacey and I sat next to each other fourth grade, so it was only a matter of time before we became an item. Like Brad and Angelina, day-to-day exposure to each other fostered a sort of kindred connection between the two of us, like survivors clinging to flotsam in a sea of uncertainty and long division. Or is it jetsam? No, no, it was flotsam. I was right the first time. Flotsam it is.

Stacey had a moustache that would have made Steve Cruz shit a brick, and her werewolf legs rivalled even mine. I can say this with a clear conscience because she ended up cheating on me with Matthew, the new kid who became a part of the Brian-Jordan-Jesse league of popularity.

Lesson Learned: A full, luscious moustache will make me go weak in the knees.

Alexandra M.

To this day, I still proudly declare myself a gold-star gay. In fact, I’m so gold-star that I’ve never even made-out with a girl. That being said, Alexandra was the first person I ever “kissed.” Here’s the thing: Alexandra was part of a family that my own family was very close to. One day after school in the fifth grade, I was in Alexandra’s room checking out her Barbies when she leaned in and kissed me on the mouth.

And I felt nothing.

I had to explore this further. I scrunched up my face like I was trying to pass a kidney stone and mashed my face against her. To say that this was “a kiss” would be like saying that getting your dick caught in your zipper is “sex.” We had all the sexual energy of a vasectomy, with roughly the same amount of blood after she ended up head-butting me in the nose. Our brief fling began as quickly as it ended, as the two of us returned to playing Barbie. Barbie was the fucking best.

Lesson Learned: I did not, and do not, get anything out of kissing girls. Although like any good scientific theorum, I needed to recreate this scenario once more to make sure.

In sixth grade, I started dating Cassandra Palangavich. Cassandra was pretty, sweet, funny, and had one of those last names that looked like it was spelled by eating a can of alphabet soup and then wiping your ass with a birth certificate. Cassandra was one of my best friends, and we did absolutely everything together. During prom, I once again scrunched up my face and smooshed my puckered mouth against hers. Lo and behold, I felt nothing. The experiment had been repeated, and I ended up with the same results. After the “kiss,” we both promised to keep in touch with each other. Neither of us did, but at least we had fun while the time lasted.

Lesson Learned: I was gay. Also, that Vitamin C song is total bullshit. Friends forever? HA! Fuck right off, you will never talk to anyone you go to elementary school with.

So thank you, to all the girls I dumped or who dumped me. You taught me many valuable lessons, that I would later use in two failed relationships, and one successful one. If any of you ever come down to Toronto, let me know, I’ll buy you a drink.

Interesting perspective. Girls were never that attracted to me, nor were gay guys. My ‘crowd’ was always straight guys, around whom I felt most comfortable and with whom I had the most in common in terms of comportment, values, interests. My late high school and early college years were a series of awkward dates as these guys struggled with their obvious affection for me and tried to reconcile it with their orientation.

this is not a good window for young people to assess their natural orientation…. certainly not in kindergarten or 5th grade…. facial hair tastes is not a reliable age specific indicator nor leg hair…. some people grow thick fuzz at 13 some at 18…. I think young people should be very careful on 3 basic issues from hand holding, kissing & touching at any age under 18…..as adults people can take full responsibilities in relationships…. but the papilloma virus is a very important issue, oral health & washing the cleanest possible hands if two people are going to touch one… Read more »

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Eddie

5 years 4 months ago

Hey! I think I’m the guy dating Katherine with a K.
Okay, I’m not, and don’t tell my wife I called her a big girl 😉
Very funny stuff.